This invention relates to the field of tools and devices for cleaning and polishing teeth used by members of the medical and dental professions. It is directed particularly to those cleaning and polishing devices which are rotated or reciprocated by a power source and require a drive mechanism for their operation.
A commonly used cleaning and polishing device of this kind is known in the dental profession as a prophylactic angle, a small cup-like device of rubber or similar material having a circular cross-section so it is rotatable and having a frusto-conical shape in elevation providing an angled or diagonally extending annular surface for better reaching recessed portions of the patient's row of teeth.
The present and prior art practice is to use the dentist's hand piece to drive and rotate the prophylactic angle. The dentist's hand piece is a powered tool to which a number of tools and devices can be connected such as drills, and the like. It is an expensive tool, one that wears out with constant use and has to be regularly replaced. When this tool is used to drive the prophylactic angle, an adapter or shaft driven connector has to be employed, which is also an expensive item and cannot be disposed of after use with a single patient. The prophylactic angle is secured to the adaptor or connector as presently used and the same one is therefore used over and over again for successive numbers of patients.
It would be desirable for sanitary purposes to have a throw-away mechanism for driving the prophylactic angle cleaning and polishing member so it could be disposed of after use with each individual patient and a completely new one used for each successive patient. It would also be desirable to use a different power source which is less expensive than the presently used hand piece and does not wear out as rapidly.
The present invention accomplishes both of those goals. It comprises an elongated flexible sheet sheath of plastic such as polyethylene which can be slipped on and over the elongated nozzle and head of the dentist's air syringe tool connected to and powered by a source of pressurized air. A plastic fitting at one end of the sheath is secured to the outlet end of the air syringe nozzle, such plastic fitting having a small turbine chamber and turbine mounted therein, also made of inexpensive disposable material, for rotation of the turbine when pressurized air is flowed through the air syringe nozzle into the turbine chamber. The prophylactic angle member is connected to the turbine and rotates with the turbine.
At the opposite end of the elongated flexible sheath is a coupling structure for securing the device to the head of the air syringe. The coupling structure is in the form of a hood which fits over the air syringe head, but with a slot along the rear wall portion to receive the stem of the palm buttom valve operator, projecting from the upper rear wall of the air syringe head, as the hood portion is placed over the head. Thus, when the disposable operating mechanism in accordance with the present invention is put in place on the air syringe, the dentist can control operation of the rotary prophylactic angle member by the palm of his hand, pushing the palm button in to open the valve and admit pressurized air to rotate the prophylactic angle member and letting up on the palm button which is normally biased outwardly to the valve closed position when he wants to stop rotation of the device. This is a further advantage of using the air syringe tool to power the prophylactic angle, since when using the hand piece as the power source the dentist has to control its "off-on" operation by a foot pedal which is less responsive and somewhat harder, somewhat more awkward to do.
The air syringe tool is less expensive than the hand piece, has less moving parts to wear, and enables the dentist's more expensive hand piece to last longer when a different power tool can be used for the cleaning and polishing function performed by the rotary prophylactic angle member.
After a patient's teeth have been cleaned and polished by the prophylactic angle driven by the dentist's air syringe and the disposable operating mechanism in accordance with this invention, the device can be easily slipped off of the air syringe and thrown away after use with a single patient. A new previously unused prophylactic angle and disposable operating mechanism in accordance with this invention can be used for each successive patient.